Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Christian Rätsch: Interview on mythology, religion and altered states

In this episode of the psychonautica podcast, Max Freakout interviews author, anthropologist and ethnopharmacologist Dr. Christian Rätsch, they talk about mythology, religion and altered state experiences, myth as a tool for understanding reality, the role of belief and the literal interpretation of Christian scripture, India as a spiritual centre, the growing popularity of ayahuasca ceremonies, the financial crisis and erosion of western values, money as a pathological collective hallucination, the difference between money and value, possible alternatives to the money system, equality and tolerance, unconditional love and freedom, the utter failure of politics and capitalism, the fallacy of dualism, the inevitable failure of hierarchical power structures, the problem of overpopulation, the measures used to deal with overpopulation in rainforest tribal societies, the role of entheogens for spreading awareness, the absence of meaning and message in the psychedelic experience, the mutual co-dependence of matter and mind, the function of shamanism, shamanism as a technology, the potential value of shamanism for western culture, western hierarchical attitudes towards shamanism, the fallacy of organized religious approaches to entheogens such as those of Santo Daime and the UDV, the difference between dualism and polarity, the polarity of mythology and philosophy, the philosophy of Nietzsche, Dionysus and Apollo, reconciling the duality of subjective and objective within science, the abuse of science as a substitute for religion, the illusion of objectivity, the ultimate goal of scientific enquiry, eschatology and 2012, linear and cyclical models of time, the end and beginning of time, inaccuracies of calendars and the shamanic role of visionary art literature and music.

About EROCx1

EROCx1 was the founding member of CyberlabZ circa 1991. A multimedia collective of artist who produced live visuals, intelligent lighting, laser shows, VR environments, music and DJ’ed many concerts, festivals, raves and other underground gatherings in Southern California. Most memorable events were: K-Rave, Narnia, Circa, FutureWorld, Big Wig Thumper.

EROCx1 has been greatly interested in entheogens and highly active in the psychedelic community since his early involvement in the Rave scene. Participating in gatherings, workshops, retreats along with reading and listening to the works of Dr. Timothy Leary, Terence & Dennis McKenna, Albert Hofmann, Richard Evans Schultes, Ram Dass, R. Gordon Wasson, Ralph Metzner, the Shulgin’s, Dale Pendell, Christian Rätsch, Jonathan Ott, Robert Anton Wilson, Carl A. P. Ruck, Rick Strassmen and many other luminaries of our time.
In 2005 it was time to take his interests in ethnobotany to the next level by founding Gaian Botanicals, which has not only been a success, but has opened many doors to meet some really great people.